THE CODE OF HANDSOME LAKE II3 



SECRET MEDICINE SOCIETIES OF THE SENECA^ 



During the last six years the writer has made a detailed field 

 study of the various phases of Iroquois culture, special attention 

 being directed to the rites and ceremonies of the semisecret orders 

 and societies that yet survive among the so-called pagan Iroquois. 

 It was only after diligent inquiry that the actual existence of these 

 societies was clearly established. The False Face Company and the 

 Secret Medicine Society, better termed The Little Water Company, 

 have been known to ethnologists for some time, but no one has ade- 

 quately described them or has seemed fully aware of their signifi- 

 cance. Likewise certain dances, such as the Bird, the Bear, the 

 Buffalo, the Dark, and the Death dances, have been mentioned. 

 Ceremonies also, such as the Otter ceremony and the Woman's 

 song, have been listed, but that back of all these ceremonies there 

 was a society never seems to have occurred to anyone. The Indians 

 do not volunteer information, and when some rite is mentioned they 

 usually call it a dance. Through this subterfuge the existence of 

 these societies has long been concealed, not only from white investi- 

 gators but from Christian Indians as well, the latter usually pro- 

 fessing ignorance of the " pagan practices " of their unprogressive 

 brothers. 



Even so close an observer as Lewis H. Morgan says : " The 

 Senecas have lost their Medicine Lodges, which fell out in modern 

 times; but they formerly existed and formed an important part of 

 their religious system. To hold a Medicine Lodge was to observe 

 their highest religious mysteries. They had two such organiza- 

 tions, one for each phratry, which shows still further the natural 

 connection of the phratry and the religious observances. Very 

 little is now known concerning these lodges or their ceremonies. 

 Each was a brotherhood into which new members were admitted 

 by formal initiation."^ 



Morgan's experience is that of most observers, close as their 

 observation may be. The writer, with the assistance of his wife, 

 however, living with the " pagans " and entering fully into their 

 rites, discovered that the '' medicine lodges," so far from having 

 become extinct, are still active organizations, exercising a great 



1 Adapted from the author's article in American Anthropologist, 2 :2, April- 

 June, 1909. 



2 Morgan, Ancient Society, p. 97, ed. 1907. 



